Automobile body panels are traditionally made of sheet metal or plastics painted with layers of pigmented paints. The painting process of these panels requires elaborate facilities and consequently large expenses. For instance, a large floor space area must be maintained in a clean room environment for the spraying of paint and clear coat and for the baking and curing of such paint and clear coat on the body panels. Moreover, solvent based paints are considered undesirable in recent years because of environmental concerns. As a result, the evaporation of such solvents must be strictly controlled.
The color matching of metallic paints containing metallic flakes has been a difficult task. This is because the color appearance of metallic paints is dependent upon the flake orientation in the paint film to a large extent. The flake orientation, in turn, is dependent upon many processing parameters. These parameters include the angle of spraying, the distance of spraying, the viscosity of the paint, etc.
It is, therefore, an object of the present invention to eliminate the painting process completely in an automobile assembly plant by using prepainted carrier films.
It is another object of the present invention to apply prepainted carrier films to vehicle body panels in an automated process.
It is a further object of the present invention to apply prepainted carrier films to vehicle body panels such that all the body panels mounted on an automobile are color matched within acceptable tolerance.
It is yet another object of the present invention to apply prepainted carrier films to automobile body panels such that a perfect color match is achieved on an automobile when metallic paints are used.